UPDATE:
The significant weather event declared on Feb. 17, 2025 by the City of Orillia was declared over effective at 10:30 a.m. on Feb. 20, 2025.
According to the city's post on Facebook, the "clearing of roads and sidewalks is in progress and crews continue to work on snow hauling during the day and overnight."
"We appreciate the community’s patience as we all deal with this significant volume of snow," noted the post.
ORIGINAL STORY
For the second time in 10 days, Orillia has declared a "significant weather event."
The city made the declaration Monday night at about 8:30 p.m. to alert residents "the current extreme weather conditions could pose a danger" to people using local roads and sidewalks.
Environment Canada issued a snow squall warning Monday for the Orillia area, with total snowfall accumulations of 30 to 60 cm forecast, through to Tuesday. People are being warned of "near zero visibility in heavy snow and blowing snow."
This warning is in addition to more than 50 cm of snow that has fallen within the past five days. In fact, local weather watcher David Brain said almost 170 cm of snow has fallen in February — the most in a single month in his more than 45 years of monitoring Orillia's weather.
"Members of the public are asked to avoid travel at this time and should be aware of the potential for deteriorating conditions both locally and area wide," noted the city's media release.
Orillia's plows "remain operational and will be maintaining roads, focusing on main arterials to support emergency vehicles," notes the media release.
"In response to the unprecedented snowfall, the city is allocating additional resources and funds for snow removal and road salt to support winter operations," says the media release.
Full cleanup efforts are expected to take a week, while "concurrently running significant snow removal" operations.
"While major snow removal operations will take place overnight throughout the week to minimize traffic disruptions, the city is also undertaking substantial daytime efforts to address the extreme snowfall," says the release.
City crews are prioritizing the most challenging areas for snow removal.
"While it is not possible to remove all snow across the city at once, operations will focus on improving road width, sightlines, and overall safety," notes the release.
Municipalities can declare a significant weather event under the Municipal Act, 2001, O. Reg. 239/02, relating to the maintenance of municipal roads, sidewalks, and bike lanes. All roadways in the municipality are deemed to be in a state of repair with respect to snow accumulation.
Orillia also declared a significant weather event on Feb. 7 after the city was slammed with more than 40 centimetres of snow that day. At the same time, the surrounding townships of Oro-Medonte, Severn and Ramara also declared significant weather events.
The city will provide updates at orillia.ca and on the city’s social media channels once the significant weather event has ended.